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The Scarlet Car — cover
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Aeneas Press edition Edwardian

The Scarlet Car

by Richard Harding Davis 1864–1916

The book, and the century it came out of.

A young man with a new motor-car and a chauffeur takes a girl and her family across New York State, and the car is the plot: a broken axle, a snowstorm, a lost road, a criminal at a level crossing. Davis was the most famous reporter of his age and the model Charles Dana Gibson drew for the Gibson Man; this 1907 book caught the automobile at the moment it was still an adventure in itself. Illustrated with 60 full-page plates — paintings by Inness, Moore and Brandes among them.

For a long time it had been arranged they all should go to the Harvard and Yale game in Winthrop’s car.
The first sentence of The Scarlet Car
A note on this edition

The Scarlet Car, by Richard Harding Davis, complete and unabridged. Spelling and punctuation follow present-day American usage; the sentences, the paragraphs and the voice are the author’s, word for word.

It was written in another era and may carry attitudes a reader today will find dated. They are kept for the sake of the work and do not reflect the views of this house.

The edition
Format
Ebook
Extent
about 64 pages
Reading time
about an hour
Illustrations
Full-page plates, credited
Text
Complete, unabridged
Language
en
This edition
2026
ISBN
9785501577381
The plates

60 paintings are bound into this edition

Six of them are shown here, taken from the volume itself. Each is reproduced full page and named with its painter and year.

Across the Hudson Valley in the Foothills of the Catskills, George Inness
Across the Hudson Valley in the Foothills of the Catskills George Inness 1868
In the Ardennes, Hippolyte Boulenger
In the Ardennes Hippolyte Boulenger 1868
Croquet Match, Winslow Homer
Croquet Match Winslow Homer 1868
The little mishap, Fritz Sonderland
The little mishap Fritz Sonderland 1868
Le Crotoy, Jules Dupré
Le Crotoy Jules Dupré 1868
At the Watering Place, Fyodor Vasilyev
At the Watering Place Fyodor Vasilyev 1868
The setting

A page from this edition

Not a mock-up: this page is taken from the finished volume. The ornament above the chapter belongs to its shelf and to no other, the opening letter is set as a drop capital, and the plate below carries the name of the painter and the year.

A page of The Scarlet Car as set for this edition
The opening of a chapter
A page of The Scarlet Car as set for this edition
A page where a plate falls

Both photographed from the finished volume.

Colophon

The Scarlet Car, issued in this edition by Aeneas Press in 2026 on the Mystery & Crime shelf. Newly set, with the ornament of its series above each chapter and a drop capital on the opening page. Illustrated with full-page plates, each named with its painter.

Published as an ebook and not issued in print by this house; it carries one ISBN, 9785501577381, and is supplied worldwide. This edition — its setting, its ornament, its cover art, and the selection and attribution of its plates — © 2026 Aeneas Press.

Before you buy

Questions readers ask

Is this the whole of The Scarlet Car?
Yes — complete and unabridged. Nothing is cut, condensed or paraphrased. This is the book, not a summary of it.
What exactly did you change?
The spelling and the punctuation follow present-day American usage. Richard Harding Davis's sentences are untouched — same words, same order, same rhythm.
Are the pictures really in the book?
Yes. The edition carries full-page plates bound into the text, each one named with its painter and the year it was made. Six of them are shown on this page.
How long is it?
About 64 pages, which is roughly about an hour of reading.
What do I actually get?
An illustrated ebook with its own ISBN, sold worldwide. One file, yours to keep, readable on any device.
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The Scarlet Car
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